NVIDIA at GDC 2013

By David Weller, posted Feb 20 2013 at 04:05PM

Once again, we are just weeks away from another awesome GDC event! We are thrilled to offer several ways to reach out to NVIDIA engineers and learn about new tools and techniques in the game development world. Be sure to bookmark our NVIDIA @ GDC 2013 events page to get the latest updates. In addition, don't hesitate to monitor our @nvidiadeveloper twitter feed for real-time news from the GDC floor.

Of course, we know what you're REALLY interested in is our sponsored sessions, and this year's sessions are a combination of "awesome" and "outstanding." We will have guest speakers from Valve, Gearbox, and Sony Online Entertaiment to talk about their experiences developing the latest games using NVIDIA technologies and tools. On top of that, be sure to attend to get the latest news on our GRID cloud gaming hardware and the new Project Shield handheld portable gaming device.

Here's the latest planned sponsored sessions, but be sure to check the NVIDIA @ GDC 2013 page for the latest updates!

The sponsored sessions, held on Thursday, March 28th in the West Hall, Room #2002, include talks and demos on a wide range of topics covering the latest advancements in GPU gaming technology. It’s open to all attendees and features developers and industry leaders from game studios and beyond.

The new Catzilla benchmark from Plastic is showcasing the latest rendering technology of their new engine. This rendering engine supports all the latest techniques, like physically correct lighting, depth-of-field, fur, volumetric and raymarching based effects, motion blur, and many other great-looking rendering effects.

Using a pre-release of Nsight 3.0, the team was able to fix 3D API and rendering bugs, and optimize their engine to squeeze every possible cycle out of the GPU and system as a whole. Along with Jeff Kiel from the NVIDIA graphics developer tools team, they’ll share their stories from the trenches to give the audience a good sense of how to take advantage of Nsight 3.0 for DirectX 11 and OpenGL 4.2 multi 3D API development.

Borderlands 2 released to critical acclaim on September 18th, 2012 and showcased a wide variety of NVIDIA CUDA®-accelerated GPU effects. This session will dive into the exact effects that were featured and their benefits to the visual fidelity of the gamer experience. Side-by-side examples of how GPU-accelerated effects are changing the gaming landscape will be demonstrated in a gaming session. Further examinations into the production process and effects creation will also be explored.

In this session, Rich Geldreich from Valve Software and John McDonald from NVIDIA will give an in-depth guide to porting games to Linux. A primarily technical discussion, Rich and John will discuss tool alternatives on Linux, OS issues and pitfalls, and porting from Direct3D to OpenGL.

APEX Turbulence and Destruction allow the creation of a more immersive game environment than was possible in previous-generation games. In section 1, we’ll illustrate the workflow and design considerations for the various APEX Turbulence examples in games such as Hawken and PlanetSide 2. APEX Turbulence simulates a massive number of particles combined with the fluid motion of velocity fields to create immersive, next-gen effects. In section 2, we'll show how a destructible environment can significantly enhance the gaming experience by creating an ever-changing battlefield. We’ll cover how the destruction effects are created and how they can be scaled based on the computing platform. In addition, we’ll discuss what to consider when using destruction in a networked game. Finally we'll provide a quick overview of the other APEX modules and tools which can be used to create a richer and more interactive game experience.

NVIDIA® Project SHIELD and Tegra® 4: Redefining AFK

4:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Andrew Edelsten, NVIDIA
Paul Hodgson, NVIDIA

NVIDIA's recently announced Project SHIELD has been the talk of gamers worldwide. Powered by the latest NVIDIA Tegra 4 processor, Project SHIELD provides gamers with the ultimate mobile gaming experience and promises to redefine what AFK really means. Come get the inside word on how to push the limits of mobile gaming and take advantage of everything that Project SHIELD and Tegra 4 have to offer. At the session, learn hot tips and tricks when targeting Project SHIELD, get a run down of the latest NVIDIA development tools, and take an in-depth look at Tegra 4's new GPU features.

This session presents the technologies behind NVIDIA GRID™ and the future of game engines running in the cloud. In the first part, we’ll present how you can develop cloud products using the GRID SDK. The audience will learn about the key components of NVIDIA GRID— like optimal capture, efficient compression, fast streaming, and low latency—that make cloud gaming possible. Franck will demonstrate how these components fit together, how to use the GRID APIs, and how to optimize their usage to deliver an ultimate cloud gaming experience. In the second part, Brent will present the future of game engines running in the cloud.